House Paint

Lots of emails flying around this week! Security wiring quotes, kitchen cabinet redesign, moving windows.... I guess it was just another week in the life of someone building a home! 

Here is a picture of the peninsula before we made it two feet shorter. We thought it crowded the stairs too much.  The window on the right is also going to be moved over 5 inches to accommodate the overhang of the peninsula. 

And here's the house today- hello paint! 

We love the way the second story looks with the white trim. At the last minute I decided to keep the vertical trim boards at the corners of the house the same color as the base, but I'm thinking that was a mistake. A house that we love up the street has it that way, but with our greenish-gray color we think the white trim really pops. There is still more work to be done on the front view (finish and paint the columns white, trim out the door etc.) We'll see how the front view looks once it is further along, but I suspect I might decide to change it back to the original plan. Ops! 

Preparing for Vacation

We are leaving for vacation for all of next week, so we've been busy making decisions about the house so things can continue while we're gone.

We had a bit of drama at the end of last week that resulted in us deciding to shorten the peninsula in kitchen. We are also going to lose a few cabinets in the kitchen, so our architect is working on re-working the cabinet plans.

Meanwhile, today I spent a bunch of time pricing out our appliances and meeting with vendors. I also made final decisions about paint and trim and started trying to decide what color stain to put on the patio ceilings. I need to take a picture, but it is a really lovely pine ceiling that we think will look just fabulous when it is stained. Now we just have to decide what color! We're guessing we will probably stain the front door the same color, so it is a big decision!

I need to update with pictures. I'll try to get some tomorrow!

Siding!

Yesterday the kids and I met Eric downtown for lunch, and since we were in the area we decided to swing by the house (oooh weee can't wait until we live closer to Eric's office!). 

We were greeted with a happy surprise- most of the siding and trim is complete! 

The shingles in the gable are a little different than what we expected, but we think it will all look great once it is painted. We are still trying to decide if those shingles should be a different color than the rest of the house. Here's a picture of a house with our paint color (Sherwin Williams Rare Gray- the second line from the top in the paint samples above). If we were to do a darker color in the gable we would probably do the same green as the one below: 

We think this house looks great, so time will tell if we copy it exactly! Note: the trim on our house is pure white instead of cream. 

In other news, our builder decided to remove/replace all of the drywall in the house- sweet! When the drywall was removed in the dining room, look what we discovered behind it- the old spot for an original window! It was covered up when the master bedroom addition was done who knows how many years ago. I think it is so cool to discover little things like this :) Now that all of the ceiling and drywall is removed I think this is the last little surprise we'll find, but I guess you never know! 

Rain, rain, go away!

Last week the trim was painted (Pure White by Sherwin Williams), the siding continued to go up, and the roof was put on! They worked really hard to get it weather tight in anticipation of weekend storms, and despite record rain and flooding in a lot of areas, our new house stayed nice and dry!

Before the bad weather hit the painter was able to put up the sample colors. Of the people who saw it (me, Eric, Sarah, Maria and the painter, Rubin) EVERY person voted on the same two colors! The most popular colors were the second from the top and the third from the bottom. The second one from the top spoke to both me and Eric, so Rare Gray by Sherwin Williams is the clear winner! Once things dry out a bit here Rubin is going to put up a possible accent color for the gables. I'll show that here once it goes up!

Blink and You'll Miss It!

Eric and I went out of town for a few days. When we left the house looked like this:

And here's how it looked when we got back:

Night and day! Man, it really looks like a house now. By the end of this week all of the siding will be up and the painter will start working on the exterior paint! Of course that means it is time to PICK exterior paint! We've given our builder the names of several colors we are interested in seeing on the house. 

This isn't a perfect representation of the colors, but it gives you a general idea. We can't decide between a normal gray/beige, a gray with a blue hue or a gray with a green hue. Another decision we have to make is to decide if we want a different/darker color in the gable (the triangle portion of the roof line on the second story). Lots of decisions to make!

Last week we got some great news- for just a little bit more $$ we can raise the ceilings on the first floor to 9 ft! The plans called to keep the ceiling as-is at 8 ft 2 inches, but with all the rains we've had it became necessary to remove the ceiling drywall- opening up the option to raise the ceiling. I am SO happy! This was literally the ONE last compromise I felt like we were making with this house! 

Here Are Your Stairs!

When we first bought the house and showed the kids, their first response was "Where are the stairs?" We told them that we were going to build some for them- and here they are!

In addition to the stairs, the second floor is in full swing. It's not looking like much yet, but it is so exciting to see in person what we have pictured in our heads for months!

View from top of stairs in to the playroom:

Looking left from top of stairs- Anderson's bedroom:

The upper back corners of the house will have Emery's room and a shared bathroom. This is a picture of the beginnings of their bathroom: